DC-paid security camera captures hit-and-run

WASHINGTON (WUSA9) - CVS Pharmacy may have some explaining to do after an incident in Northeast D.C. this weekend.

Northeast is the type of neighborhood where people work hard and take care of what they own, like the blue 1998 Chevrolet Prism parked on Staples St. just before 2 a.m. Saturday.

The owner said she’s had the car since college.

“It’s still running obviously. We weren’t exactly ready to get a new car,” Carling Uhler said. Which is why she and her husband weren’t exactly thrilled to find the car’s fender mangled with a gash through the driver-side tire on April 22.

“It makes me mad because I was doing nothing and, you know, have to deal with this now,” said Uhler.

She didn’t find a note, and there was no door knock to let someone know the crash happened.

But Uhler’s front porch security camera captured the whole incident. When she and her husband checked out the video, they discovered an unsuspecting suspect: an 18-wheeler with ‘CVS Pharmacy’ plastered on the side, trying to make a turn onto Staples St. for about 10 minutes.

“Well we woke up at the time because it was such a loud bang, we thought it was a gunshot or something,” said Uhler’s husband, who asked not to be identified.

Metropolitan Police took a report. The department doesn’t take hit & runs lightly, but the only reason they can even investigate is because of the camera that Uhler said D.C. paid for.

The city launched a reimbursement program last year. They’ll give up to a $500 rebate per home—and even more for a business—as long as you meet the requirements, and there are still funds in the program. The tradeoff is D.C. can request video investigating crimes that may have happened in the camera’s vicinity.